Current affairs

'Family is my 'chithis': Kamala Harris goes a real Tamil girl during her speech as VP Candidate!

By alagu, 20 August, 2020
United States, Elections, Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, Donald Trump

When US Presidential candidate of Democratic party Joe Biden picked Kamala Harris as his running mate for the upcoming US Presidential elections, it has made headlines across and beyond the borders as Kamala Harris had carried many 'firsts' before her name and she has been regarded as the significant pick to the brave fight of the Democrats in defeating Donald Trump from securing another term in the office. 

With being nominated for the candidacy of the Vice President of the United States, Kamala Harris had made history after becoming the first woman, first Black woman, first Asian- American, and first India- American woman to get nominated for the second-highest office of the United States from the major political party's ticket. As Joe Biden has officially become the presidential candidate of the Democratic party, Kamala Harris had got a clear go to take on incumbent Mike Pence and his boss to replace him with Joe Biden. 

 

Kamala Harris has accepted the Democratic Party's nomination for the US Vice President and during her acceptance speech that she delivered on Wednesday in the virtual Democratic National Convention, she had remembered her mother, her family, and the Indian heritage. Though remembering the family is a typical speech, she suddenly won the hearts of Tamil people after she mentioned the word 'chithis'. Chithi is a Tamil word that denotes 'Aunt' and the moment she spoke Tamil from the international arena, Tamil people went emotional and started celebrating her in social media. 

 

It was indeed the first time when the US Vice Presidential Candidate spoke a Tamil word and she had poured a pleasant surprise for Tamilians and pride for her maternal ancestors. In her address, she remembered her mother Shyamala Gopalan Harris, who died in 2009, and grieved the fact that she wasn't able to be there to see the achievement of her daughter. 

She said, "My mother taught me that service to others gives life purpose and meaning. And oh, how I wish she were here tonight but I know she's looking down on me from above. My mother instilled in my sister Maya and me the values that would chart the course of our lives. She raised us to be proud, strong black woman, and she raised us to know and be proud of our Indian Heritage". 

While speaking about the Indian heritage and her family, Harris said, "Family is my husband Doug, who I met on a blind date set up by my best friend. Family is our beautiful children, Cole and Ella, who as you just heard, call me Momala. Family is my sister. Family is my best friend, my nieces, and my godchildren. Family is my uncles, my aunts, and my chithis. For a moment, she paused Americans and surprised Tamilians as while Americans went busy on googling what chithi means, Tamil people went into celebrations and some had gone emotional by shedding tears. 

 

Harris further recalled her mother and said that her mother taught them to keep the family at the center of their world and she also pushed them to see a world beyond themselves. She said, "She said us to be conscious and compassionate about the struggles of all people and to believe public service is a noble cause and the fight for justice is a shared responsibility and she taught us to put family first the family you're born into and the family you choose". 

Kamala Harris said that she thinks that what her mother must have thought when she first gave birth at 25-year-old. Harris further stated that "On that day, she probably could have never imagined that I would be standing before you now speaking these words- I accept your nomination for Vice President of the United States of America".  Harris added that her mother instilled in her a vision of 'our nation as a beloved community, where all are welcome, no matter what we look like, where we come from, or who we love'.

 

Kamala Harris's mother Shyamala Gopalan was a native of Chennai, Tamil Nadu and she went to the United States at the age of 19 and joined the University of California Berkeley with the dream of curing cancer. In the varsity, she met Donald Harris, who came to the United States from Jamaica to study economics. They fell in love when marching together for justice in the civil rights movement of the 1960s. 

 

The duo gave birth to Kamala and Maya Harris and they got separated when Kamala Harris was five-years-old after which the daughters were raised by single mother. Kamala Harris was born in Oakland, California and she graduated a law degree from the UC Hastings following which she started her career by working at the District Attorney's office in Hastings. She then became the Attorney General of San Francisco and she went on to become the first woman Attorney General of California, the most populous state in the United States. 

 

With the strong experience in the judicial front, she was elected to the US Senate from California in 2017 and she has been serving as the junior US Senator. In what has become the remarkable feat in her life, she has now won the candidacy of the US Vice President from the major political party ticket and being a woman of Chennai descent, she has become the influential face of the US Elections to take on and defeat Donald Trump. 

 

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